Intruders: they make themselves at home in our dwelling-places, our churches. Many’s the time I have found myself sweeping away their debris before starting an eight-o-clock service. Rats, bats, mice, wasps. They find themselves drawn to a life of intrusion. It is so now. It was so when Moles, rats, mice and lizards come under the ban.(CEV 11). Eagles, vultures, buzzards, crows, ostriches, hawks, seagulls are regarded with disgust. Bats are included. Grass hoppers are not; they get the OK.
We like to confirm our green credentials but some wild animals make that difficult. The person who introduced mink to the UK in the 1920s must have some sleepless nights about the success of his efforts. And to move from the animal to the vegetable realm Japanese knot-weed must offend us all.
If we live in a crowded planet, we can hardly avoid these questions. They get into our nursery rhymes (‘Three blind mice’), our pest control offenders (squirrels), our farmer’ bad books (weasels and foxes). We manage as best we can to provide environments our favourite creatures require but we still find a use for the word ‘vermin’. Reptiles are distasteful companions for most humans.
And a Christian believer has other mischief-makers to deal with. Jude hands out a diatribe against false teachers. He is unsparing in his language and sees intruders as a potent factor in the tussle between those who follow Peter and Paul and those who set out to subvert their teaching. We in our generation are well advised to avoid the kind of terminology chosen by Jude. At the same time we have to remember that the early church had its Ananias and Sapphira, its Simon the magician, and violent persecution to encounter.
Sneers and sniggers may come our way but on the whole civilised society respects honest faith even if it seems incomprehensible. Perhaps we should regard intruders as possible recruits rather than deadly enemies.
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